


the force is a horror story

by Darth Occlus (NotSummer)



Category: Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Amnesia, Blood, Body Horror, Eldritch, Gen, Horror, Jedi, Memory Loss, Nightmares, Psychological Horror, References to Depression, Sith, The Force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2018-05-23
Packaged: 2019-05-13 04:30:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 1,937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14742015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotSummer/pseuds/Darth%20Occlus
Summary: The Force will give you exactly what you ask for. This is never what you want.A series of short stories reinterpreting the Force as something terrible.





	1. the healer

The Force is a horror story.

None know this like the healers who throw themselves on the front lines. 

A healer stands in front of a Dark Lord, and lightning hurts them but it does not wound them. That injury had been healed a dozen battles ago. It cannot mark the healer now.

A healer climbs out from under a rock fall. They’ve had broken bones before. People ask how they survived. The Force was with them. Their bones did not break.

A healer cleanses themself of sickness. They look in the mirror a week later, and they look younger. The age that had made them vulnerable is gone too.

A healer stands before twisted beings, those who have consumed the Force and by consumed by it in turn. The healer is consumed as well: they do not injure, and they do not die.

The Force is a horror story.


	2. the sentinel

The sentinel speeds through battles. Their speed wins them the day, week after week, battle after battle, until their prowess with the Force is so great, time seems to stand still.

Then it does.

The sentinel stands on the battlefield, surrounded by corpses still on their feet. The first one killed has yet to hit the ground.

Has yet to even start falling.

They look around. No breeze flows. Everything is still. They look down at their hands, and they watch their joints become gnarled and their skin withered and cracked.

They scream.

They reach for the Force, and it stands by. It does not move.

Nothing moves.

Their heart stops. Their bones hit the ground. They turn to dust, scattered over the ground.

Time resumes.

The sentinel is listed as Missing In Action. They are one of many sentinels on the list.


	3. the shadow

There is a place all Shadows go to die, if they survive long enough. They are not told of it. The young do not hear the whispers.

It is the ones who have gone before who whisper the location to them. The whispers begin when Shadows struggle to return to the light, to the places where they are seen.

The whispers begin when Shadows can no longer be spotted among a crowd.

The whispers begin when the Shadows start to fade in and out of sight.

To disappear has a price: one day you never appear again.

The Temple is guarded by nothing but a deep canyon. It needs no guards. The shadows in the canyons move and speak. Those who aren’t supposed to be there simply vanish. Everything vanishes in that canyon.

This is their destination.

The Shadows step into the shadows.

And then they are nothing but whispers.


	4. the guardian

There is a Guardian. Nothing touches them.

In battle, they are the invulnerable shield in front of their troops.

They will be the defender the people of the galaxy need. Lightsabers rebound from them, and blaster fire does not mark their armor. Legions flee before them. They are unstoppable and immovable.

And then one day, they reach for a meiloorun.

It bounces away from their fingers.

They cannot touch it.

They dehydrate and starve. 

There is a Guardian. Nothing touches them.


	5. the jedi

A Jedi chooses to give their emotions to the Force.

There is no emotion, there is peace. All is as the Force wills it.

The Jedi seeks strength to fight, to work past their fear.

All is as the Force wills it.

They find peace, and they would enjoy it if enjoyment did not break their peace. They have their duty and so they serve. They are at peace.

Years later, they walk past a murdered village. They are a Jedi, and so they investigate. They know their duty to the galaxy. They do blink as they step through a puddle of blood. They do not waver as they raise their feet over bodies.

They feel nothing.

They are at peace.

They have given their emotions to the Force, and all is as the Force wills it.


	6. pyschometry

Pyschometry is an honored talent, their Master assures them. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge, after all.

They are assigned to crime scenes of notable dignitaries. They become invaluable, seeing what happened by touching objects involved. They hone their skills, seeing more and more.

It’s their duty to solve crimes, to ensure justice is brought upon those who would do harm.

That is the way of the Jedi. Justice, peace, and wisdom, to be shared with all.

The Council assures them there’s no such thing as too much knowledge. That would be laughable, especially when the Archives cover millenia: no one knows what hides inside them.

And yet.

Their skill is honed.

They cannot stop seeing things. Every step on the Temple floors is to witness its destruction throughout the ages. Every step into the Council chambers is to see every judgement, every mistake.

Every step is to relive a hundred deaths, to watch a thousand lives be snuffed out, to watch civilizations rise and fall.

There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.

With every touch, the Jedi sees all that has happened.


	7. the spacer

Every child dreams of the stars and what’s among them. Some even get to be pilots.

They listen to the old spacers at the bars, and they hear tall tales and old legends. The stars know you’re there. The void knows you’re there, they whisper.

Only after they’ve had enough to drink, and only when the sun burns away the gaze of the night sky.

It watches, they say.

Some dismiss this as superstition. Others listen.

The ones who listen return to port after long trips with a new look in their eye. The ones who didn’t don’t return at all.

Superstitions continue, especially when the pilots’ sensors beep an all clear but their gut says to run to get out, to find somewhere to hide from the void encroaching, surrounding, penetrat-

 

Every spacer dreams of the stars and what’s among them.

Some even get to retire.


	8. the sorcerer

The Force grants power to those who can wield it.

To take power from your enemies and strengthen yourself: it is only logical. To prove your strength in conquest, and use that proof to conquer even more: is that not the way of the Sith?

The sorcerer does not falter.

Take care, the elders warn them. They do not listen. The power is there, it’s so easy for the taking.

And it is.

It’s so easy, they wonder why no one seems to use drains.

Then they don’t.

They are not taking just power.

They’ve taken from a thousand souls, and now the memories and the skills are coming with the power.

They see themself as they strip power to feed, and see a monster through eyes that were not theirs and yet are now their own. They something terrible. They see something removed from being whatever they were before.

They take. They cannot stop taking. They are bloated on thousands of lives, millions of memories of lives they never lived crammed into their head and they cannot stop.

The Force grants power to those who can wield it. But the Force never warns about the price all pay for their power.


	9. the padawan

Reach out: what do you see?

It’s the first lesson any Jedi learns. The Force connects the Jedi to all life. The Force connects life to life. 

Keep reaching. Jedi skills are meant to be honed and used. To amplify your senses is to ensure threats are seen, that solutions are not missed, that clues are not passed by. To see around them is necessary to the pursuits of a Jedi.

But sometimes, there’s a Jedi who forgets to look away. They watch, reaching out with their senses.

Their hearing is taken over by their heartbeat echoes by the quadrillions of heartbeats around the Temple on Coruscant. The screaming of air molecules as they impact the millions of speeders.

Their touch is taken over by fire as a soft draft brushes against them. Their robes hurt. Everything hurts. They can feel their organs inside them, pulsing, beating, rubbing against tendons and bones and muscles and other organs.

Their sight is taken over by Coruscant: the shining world. It gleams. And the Jedi screams: it’s so bright, and they see everything, not a single scene is missed. Not the underhanded deals in the Senate nor the murders in back alleys in the deep.

Their smell is overtaken by the recycled air, by the stench rising from the lower levels: of despair and abandonment and survival. It’s overtaken by the gilded perfumes of the highest levels, blowing through the open window: luxury hiding malice and greed.

Reach out: what do you see?


	10. electric judgement

There’s no need for fighting.

The Jedi wields Electric Judgement, a pacifist’s tool. Green lightning, dancing around their fingers. It leaves no burn, it leaves no pain. It only saps the will to stand and fight. It only drains the strength to rebel against defeat.

It’s the perfect skill for a Jedi. After all, the Jedi stand for peaceful solutions, and the Electric Judgement brings peace.

It brings peace in the courtrooms when those who have been Judged never bother to fight their convictions.

It brings peace in the medical bays of retreating forces, when no one fights their wounds.

It brings peace when people go to sleep and never struggle to wake back up.

It brings peace when there’s no will to stand, to grab food and water from the kitchen.

There’s no need for fighting.


	11. force doppelganger

They say it’s possible to copy one’s self.

With enough time and introspection, they can learn to know themself well enough to project a perfect copy, and illusion. An imitation.

It’s a handy skill on the battlefield: if no one knows who they are, then they can’t get hit. Therefore it’s easy for them to project themself onto the battlefields. Twice the lightsabers, one truth.

Their enemies are confused, and their allies are bolstered. There’s a war on: skills that might have been dismissed as dirty tricks are acceptable if they keep casualties from mounting.

One day, they brush past their projection. They think for a second they feel soft skin instead of empty air, the beat of blood through veins instead of nothingness behind the illusion.

The projection fades. They dismiss it as a hallucination formed by adrenaline after a long battle.

One day they notice a mark on their cheek. It was on the right, wasn’t it? Why is it on the left? They can’t quite remember.

They say it’s possible to copy one’s self.


	12. flash burn

A mission goes wrong. The Jedi involved goes to the Halls of Healing. There’s nothing they can do for a shattered mind. The Jedi has to give their nightmares, their memories, to the Force.

It takes time, but eventually the Jedi can’t remember what went wrong.

They return to their life: negotiations, missions, and meditating.

They dream occasionally, but they never know what they dream about, only that it leaves them afraid.

Odd, they think. There’s nothing they have to be afraid of.

Another mission goes wrong, and they seek out the Halls of Healing. Welcome back, the healers say.

The Jedi can’t remember being here before, but they dismiss it. The healers see a lot of people. Being a Jedi is dangerous. They probably just got mixed up.

They leave, and they banish their nightmares. It feels familiar, but they’re an excellent Jedi. They haven’t had a mission go wrong before.

When they wake up, they have clawed at themselves in their sleep. Blood drips down their blankets.

Why? What do they fear? There is nothing to fear.


End file.
